THE MARGINAL SLOWLY COMING TO THE CONSTRUCTIVE FIELD
Lilit Poghosyan
Hayots Ashkhar Daily
24 Sep 2008
Armenia
Member of RPA parliamentary faction, Chairman of Financing -Budgetary
Committee Gagik Minasyan responds our questions.
"Judging from all radical opposition is facing a serious alternative,
"War or Peace". What do you think will be the solution of this
alternative?"
"The situation existing in the camp of the radical opposition can be
explained by certain circumstances.
Firstly the experience showed that the "lightning program" by which
they were trying to achieve their end remained unrealized. The
radical opposition failed to find an army of followers to support
their approaches.
The first reason is that the ruling authorities also see all the
objective problems and failings underscored by the opposition. These
problems are enshrined in Serge Sargsyan’s pre-election program and
are realized in the form of both legislative reforms and changes
noticed in the government’s activity.
Of course during the previous years we had significant achievements,
but meanwhile lots of problems have been accumulated which need
solution. The gradual solution of these problems deprives the radical
opposition of the social grounds, based on which they wanted to advance
their programs. In my view this is the main reason why the opposition,
in essence, refuses the expecta tions of "lightening success" and is
trying to start a long-term struggle, in order to provide its place
in the political field.
Secondly the changes noticed in the region, in my view will continue
for a long time and new challenges are in store for the three countries
of South Caucasus and in this situation the opposition of Armenia as
well as Georgia and Azerbaijan must harmonize their steps with those
challenges. This is maybe the second reason why our pro-oppositional
leaders take more balanced steps.
In my view our opposition will gradually shift to the constructive
field and will try to ensure a stable place for themselves, in the
political palette.
And, if due to all this we manage to have a normally acting, healthy
opposition it will only make our political palette richer."
"But before that, it was Ter-Petrosyan who enriched the radical
vocabulary. If, before, he used to say that those who are not with
him are lees, in his 10 minutes’ speech delivered on September 21 he
separated the people between nomads and settled. He said, "Not the
nomads but the settled are the owners of the country." And you say
healthy opposition, constructive field…"
"These expressions can’t have positive impact on the political
developments, because firstly they have nothing to do with the reality
and secondly they are simply destructive.
As regards the political developments in general, these developments
are not always harmonized with the formulations of the opposition
leaders. They develop under more grounded motives. And the
announcements made by the opposition leaders can be conditioned by
certain strategic issues. In my view we must judge from real processes
and not announcements though they are also important."
"Anyway the aggressive wing of the opposition is not inspired of the
"long term" prospect and the "movement" is obstinately trying to
be involved in "decisive actions". Are you sure the "eagles" will
fall short."
"Each movement has wings during its development and in this case it is
evident that radical opposition also has wings. If this wing manages
to win the radical opposition will appear in the marginal field and
the positive thing that they could have given to our political field
will simply evaporate.